The suspended and disgraced Ryan Braun was, of course, the 2011 National League MVP. In the balloting, he won a tight race over Dodgers outfielder Matt Kemp (I join my colleague Matt Snyder in thinking that Kemp should've won in the first place), and in the wake of Braun's temporary banishment, Kemp's teammate Skip Schumaker called for the award to be handed over to Kemp.

Now, Kemp himself has, in less-than-emphatic terms, told the AP that he agrees with Schumaker. When asked whether he thinks Braun's MVP hardware should be handed over, here's what Kemp said:

"I mean, yeah, I do. I feel like it should be, but that's not for me to decide, you know?"

That sounds like a guy who'd rather not be answering that particular question. Like I said, less than emphatic.

What is emphatic is the response of Jack O'Connell, secretary of the Baseball Writers Association of America, the organization tasked with voting on and awarding the MVP each year. When asked whether stripping Braun of his award was a possibility, O'Connell batted it down straightaway. "The decision was already made," O'Connell told the AP via email. "He won it."